


The Subtle Blade

by tielan



Series: Skin Deep [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Community: kink_bingo, F/M, Masturbation, Shaving, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-23
Updated: 2013-04-23
Packaged: 2017-12-09 08:15:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/772032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/pseuds/tielan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve had this sudden urge to do something that would make her look at him – to cough, to ask her to smile, to take her waist in his hands and pull her into his lap…</p><p>Dangerous thoughts when she was holding a sharp blade near his face.</p><p>Dangerous thoughts at any time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Subtle Blade

**Author's Note:**

> For my Kink Bingo box - "skin deep" - first square ' _shaving/depilation_ '. Eight other boxes to fill; let's see how far through this we get...

Of all the people Steve expected to find outside his apartment door, Lieutenant Hill didn't even make the list.

"May I come in?" Dressed in civilian clothing, the Lieutenant's expression gave no hint of whether she expected him to acquiesce, or whether she expected him to close the door in her face.

Politeness compelled him to step back and allow her in, although he resented the intrusion into his personal space – however small and unwelcoming the apartment was. He'd been aware S.H.I.E.L.D. was keeping an eye on him, but he didn't like being confronted with it.

She didn't come in very far – enough so he could shut the door. "Agent Coulson's personal effects were distributed yesterday," she said without preamble. "He left me something I think he would rather you had."

As she spoke, she brought out a large rectangular parcel, perhaps the size of a family bible, worn at the corners. When she put it into Steve's hand, the things inside shifted within the old, softened leather held together by old brass snaps.

Steve glanced at the Lieutenant as he began to open it, then moved to the desk the better to see in daylight.

It unrolled with a clink of old metal – engraved silver, polished steel. A shaving set – old fashioned and elegant. The handles of the blade and the brush were matching ebony, carved in elegant scrolls; the containers for aftershave and soap and the container for mixing were engraved with the same scrolls – a matching set.

Steve looked up at the Lieutenant, stunned by the history that he could feel in the shaving kit. "This is old." It would have been old when he was young.

"It belonged to his great-great-grandfather when the family came over to America in the late 1880s. It was always handed down to the oldest son in the family."

"I can't take this."

"You'll use it," she said, bluntly. "I won't."

Steve frowned. "So why did he leave it to you? I'm sorry," he said as her expression shifted, subtle in the shadows but unmistakeable. "That's personal, ignore it."

Lieutenant Hill hesitated, her eyes drifting to the window as voices floated up to them from the street outside. "His cards of you were personal – his own. This was his family's."

"Shouldn't it go back to his family, then?"

"He was the last of his family," Lieutenant Hill said, her voice quiet and sad. "He respected and admired you, and I can't imagine anyone else who he'd want to have it - anyone else who'd value it."

Steve swallowed. "Then...thank you." He looked down at the set, his fingers resting on the razor's handle.

"It’ll need some grinding," Lieutenant Hill said after a moment. "I know a barber shop up in Brooklyn that will do it if you don't have the equipment yourself. Or they can replace the blade if you prefer."

Steve tilted his head, surprised. "You know how to use this?"

"Yes."

He hesitated, wondering if saying it would be rude. Sometimes it was hard to tell what he could and couldn’t say these days. "I'd have thought it was a bit old-fashioned for you."

Lieutenant Hill always seemed like a thoroughly modern woman – from the opening of her own doors right through to the cool disdain with which she treated Stark's flatteries.

It was a moment before she responded. "We told Phil he was a bit old-fashioned from time to time. It's not necessarily a bad thing."

* * *

The knock at the door of the helicarrier guest quarters came as he was looking at the scruff of his beard in the mirror and the tremble in his hands and wondering if he would have to call Bruce or Barton to borrow one of their modern razors.

After the last ninety-six hours, even Steve was struggling to keep his hands steady.

"Come in," he called, expecting it to be one of his team-mates. But when he glanced out, Lieutenant Hill was standing by the now-closed door, her brows raised when she saw him in nothing but a towel.

"I thought you might need a shave," she said, frankly. A faint flush stained her cheeks. "I'm offering my services as barber."

"I'd have thought you'd prefer to cut my throat." Then he winced. "Sorry. That was out of line."

"Just a little. You might like to ease back on the Tony Stark impressions.” She said it deadpan. “ _His_ throat I would cut, except that then I'd have Pepper after me and I wouldn't like my chances.”

Steve grinned a little. He had a healthy respect and affection for Miss Potts, who managed Tony Stark’s life, business, and affections and was one of the loveliest people Steve had yet met in the modern world.

“At any rate, I have a steady pair of hands if you’re willing to risk me with sharp things by your throat. Alternatively, I can lay hands on a modern razor or an electric shaver – whichever you prefer.”

“Where did you learn to shave a guy?”

“A barber shop up in Brooklyn.”

He hadn’t managed to get up there in the end, just letting JARVIS find another blade for the set. “The same one where you said I could get the blade ground?”

“Yes.” When Steve arched his brows in silent question, her lips pressed together. “My grandfather used to own it.”

The reaction surprised him. “Are you ashamed of him?”

“No,” she bit out. “But I don’t like sharing personal information with professional colleagues.”

_And that’s told me._

Steve knew he should go for the modern razor – he’d used them before, it would be easier. But he liked the feel of the straight-razor shave – and he was curious.

“When was the last time you shaved a guy?”

The Lieutenant rolled her eyes. “Two weeks ago; he survived the experience, and even had no complaints, I can provide you with his name and number if you’d like to call him and get a reference... _Do_ you want my help, Rogers, or should I just send someone along with one of the standard-issue Schicks?”

It felt a little odd getting into his trousers in the main room while listening to her stropping the blade. On the other hand, the steady sound was reassuring – she seemed to know what she was doing.

Standing outside the bathroom door with his hand poised to knock, Steve did wonder what he was doing, entrusting his face and his throat to a woman who, from all reports, didn’t particularly like the Avengers, although she seemed companionable enough with Natasha and Barton.

But when she called for him to enter, she had the razor waiting, the mug and brush ready, and was just wringing out a hot towel.

“How often you do this?”

“Once or twice a month on my days off.”

“Once or twice—?” She gestured to the toilet seat where the lid was already lowered. Steve sat down and was handed the hot towel to wrap around his jaw, but paused to hazard a guess, “Your grandfather’s barber shop is still open?”

“His assistant owns and runs the shop now, but he sits in and chats with all the old customers and reassures the younger ones. When I go to see him, I usually shave a customer or two before we have lunch.”

Steve wasn’t expecting the sudden fond smile that flashed across her features – the brilliant, gut-stomping beauty of it. It softened the harsh planes of her face, lit up her eyes, and jolted him like lightning in his balls, a sudden pit in his stomach, freefall at fifteen thousand feet.

Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.

Too late to back out.

The Lieutenant rolled up her sleeves with quick, neat movements, prepped the lather with expert strokes, then took the towel from his face. When her thumb rubbed over his cheek, Steve nearly leaned into the touch before realising it wasn’t a caress – she was testing his beard. He flushed, but the apology was lost on his lips as she turned away to reach for the cup and brush.

She lathered him with brisk swirls of the brush, careful and thorough, tipping his face with an impersonal finger at his chin. Then she narrowed eyes that looked oddly green by the fluorescent overhead lights, picked up the razor and began.

Steve had been shaved by other people before. But not often, never by a woman, and certainly never like this.

She shaved him with swift strokes, brisk, but gentle, too. The blade slid down against his cheeks, light as a lingering caress while her fingers stretched the skin for a closer shave. Her gaze was intent, but she wasn’t nervous or worried – just focused on the task at hand.

Right now, Lieutenant Hill wasn’t even seeing him as a person - he was nothing more than a task that had to be completed.

The sensation was odd; Steve had this sudden urge to do something that would make her _look_ at him – to cough, to ask her to smile, to take her waist in his hands and pull her into his lap…

Dangerous thoughts when she was holding a sharp blade near his face.

Dangerous thoughts at any time.

Her mouth pursed with a subtle curve as she navigated his upper lip. Steve reminded himself to breathe as her fingertips framed his face and her thumbs guided his head up so she could shave his chin. Now her eyes were as bright and deep as the sea in sunlight, and her lashes looked thick as black silk as she narrowed her eyes to carefully navigate his lower lip and jawline.

Steve closed his eyes and the razor’s scrape against his skin was silken as a kiss.

His hands had been shaking before; now his whole body quivered. His pulse was like a drumbeat in his head, in his balls.

God help him, Steve could imagine the guys at the barber shop fighting to be privileged with one of the Lieutenant’s day-off shaves.

He could imagine himself among them.

It was the trust as the blade angled its way down his throat. It was the gentleness as she scraped the bristles away. It was the cool of her fingertips against his skin, the stringent scent of shaving cream and hot flesh, and the sharp, edged beauty of her as she gave her full attention to the job.

To have Lieutenant Maria Hill’s full, undivided attention with a blade in her hand? Was a terrifying and exquisite sensation.

She cleaned up in front of his ears with small, quick strokes of the blade. Then tilted his face this way and that without a word, studying to ensure that she’d gotten all of it. Her thumb stroked across his cheek. Steve stifled a groan. Yeah, he was hard as a rock in his trousers.

“Satisfied?” The hoarse query escaped his lips.

Her gaze punched through him like a bullet from a gun, faintly frowning.

“It’s good enough for the first pass,” she said critically. “Did you want me to do a cross-grain run?”

“No.” Steve smiled to ease the abruptness of his answer. “I don’t want to be late.” The truth was that if she shaved him again, he’d probably come in his trousers. As it was, he was stiff enough that he’d need to ease himself at least once before he’d be presentable.

At least he’d draped a towel across his trousers to keep them from getting spattered during the shave – the bunching would hopefully hide his erection.

She didn’t notice, but shrugged, straightening up and setting the razor on the cup before running the facecloth beneath the stream of warm water and wiping off any lingering remnants of shaving cream with brisk gentleness. “I’ll leave you to clean-up and get dressed, then. President’s due to touch down in…twenty-two minutes.”

With his cock chafing as he stood, Steve maintained enough composure to see her to the door and tell her, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” was her answer, and she left with as little fanfare as she’d arrived, a job well done.

Steve knew it wasn’t personal, and yet he was simultaneously amused and annoyed by her swift departure.

And very, very grateful for it.

As it was, the instant he’d closed and locked the door behind her, he went back into the bathroom and shut that door, too.

His hands were still shaking as he took himself out and began stroking his cock. He thought of her – of her  fingertips on his skin, of those glacial eyes staring through him as she wielded the razor by his face. He thought of that mouth under his, proud and certain, of her pulse under his lips, fast and throbbing, of her eyes looking at him and _seeing_ him as her hands wrapped around his cock.

Would she let him touch her? Would she let him taste her? Or would she just work him to brisk ejaculation, spilling him into her hands as though he was a job that needed doing and nothing more?

He ached. Masturbating was a poor substitute, but it was relief. That was all he needed right now.

Steve panted with his face pressed against the tile for a full minute before forcing himself to move. Then he cleaned himself up and got dressed as the Lieutenant had advised, and hoped the high flush on his now-shaven cheeks would fade.

But as he dressed himself in preparation for the Presidential visit to the helicarrier, Steve wondered what it would be like to cut himself on such a woman.


End file.
